Admiral Stanford sat in his command chair on the second level of the Zeus's bridge, pondering about how this ship could have been created? It took up 2 million men and woman to create the Prewar class Battle Cruisers, and not to mention 50 trillion dollars for each ship. Only 5 ships were created in total, Zeus was the 1rst of that kind to receive commissioning. These Ships were a dream just a year ago and here he was now, sitting in the top level in a delicate leather chair and staring down to the level below, watching his crew work. He pressed a button on his left hand keypad and a hologram came up. He punched in a few codes and then chose ship characteristics. He started to read the weapons and ordinance the Zeus carried.

Main Weapon: 10 special recoil MAC guns [4 on the bottom fore, 2 on each side, and 2 on the top] that fire a special heavy splintering round. They recycle the energy to fire 3 rounds a gun with one shot.

3 heavy shields based on revolutionary technology from Mjolnir Armour for Spartan II

Stanford let out a long whistle and called down to the Comm. to find out about the positions of the rest of the Prewar class ships.

"Sir I will pop them up on your console," replied the Comm. Officer.

Suddenly! A grid came up and showed all of the UNSC ships around Earth, all looked like ants on the grid, even the mighty Marathon Class Cruiser, except 4 other ships that looked like beetles. 2 Prewar Battle Cruiser, the Fidel Castro and the Marshall Ping took position around the Asian continent, but 1 came right behind the Zeus, it was the Georgi K Zhuckov. Both ships were on a dangerous mission; basically you could call it a Kamikaze mission. They were to take back Reach from the Covenant, and it was dangerous even for these majestic ships.

"Engines!, are the Reactors running," Stanford yelled to LT. Cardoza

"Affirmative Sir," he replied.

"It's time to rock and roll, let's get movin," bellowed Stanford.

Then both ships started to move, slowly at first then picking up momentum.

"Sir! How are we going to beat them at Reach, I mean if we could run dark, then we might have a chance, but aren't the Covenant going to notice a 5 KM long ships hole when we enter? Asked Lt. Naslund, who was manning the weapons console?

"I do not know Lt." Replied Stanford.

As the two ships sped on a out bound vector, a single Longsword Fighter came out of Slipstream space, and on the port side it read Pillar Of Autumn. 15 minutes later the 5 KM long ships tore a hole in space, and headed for their heroic mission.

12 hours later the Zeus and Georgi k Zhuckov came out of slipstream, about 1,000,000,000 out of Epsilon Eridani's edge, on purpose. Both ships headed towards Reach at a vicious velocity, charging their weapons and their shields along the way. The Covenant however did not pay any attention; they thought it was just an asteroid; over seeing that Humanity could build such big ships. They just sat their and orbited Reach, all 150 ships. Down below their was no glint of a shiny surface that a glassed planet was supposed to have, but it just had a few craters made by the Hovak nukes. Reach was still alive and Humanity would wage a small battle to take back the planet, and it would also change the course of the war.

Ommaaa Gullahh stood at the Bridge of his War Carrier, The Gods Fist [the one with the white blue laser] and he read the hourly report.

"My elite master, I have some bad news," Whimpered a grunt, "we have not found the Spartans yet."

"Don't worry, just keep on looking, they got to be hiding," Chuckled Ommaa

Suddenly! The bridge went bright red and alarms went off. One computer was shouting Contact, Contact.

"Report," he yelled

That would be the last thing he would say has 15 MAC rounds struck the ship, the shields rippled and popped has the first 5 hit. Then 3 hit and gutted the engine room, 2 hit the bridge section and 5 sprayed around bow. The Gods Fist started to list to the starboard side; then it broke in to 4 sections under the great stress. Around the War Carrier, 3 destroyers went in flames, 2 cruisers as well. Then came in the Archer II's, only this time for the battle of Reach their was no Star Port for suicide shields, and the Covie's needed one.

The humans had caught the Covies by surprise, and were giving them hell. As the two battlecruisers did evasive maneuvers to dodge enemy plasma bolts, their engines hastily tried to recharge the MAC's guns on the double.

The Archer II missiles were really effective at knocking out Covenant ships. The humans had not found a way to make plasma self guide itself, but they still knew how to make the potent weapon. These indigenous missiles carried plasma in it's gas state until mini lasers turned the plasma into liquid a few seconds before impact. In the missile's journey, the guidance package took care of making sure the weapon met its target. The HE warhead splits apart from the missile before the it hit, so if at least the plasma took the shields down, the warhead would fry the starships electronics. To making sure the missiles did not end up molten metal from point defense weaponries, the missiles were programmed to do evasive "S" maneuvers.

Has the Zeus's first batch of missiles streaked towards their target, the Covenant ships started to turn, and charge their weapons. Point defense lasers flashed trying to find their mark, but kept on missing. The missiles swerved ferociously trying to avoid getting a hit. Here and there some lasers found their mark, but of the missiles hit a ship. All around the Covenant fleet shields flashed and then went dead, and then the HE warheads went off, frying at least 80% of each ships electronics. Communication software's could not be sent off to ask for reinforcements, fiber optic cables carried to EMP to the onboard computers and rendering them useless. With that the Covenant ships couldn't recharge their shields or charge their weapons. 75 Ships were out of the fight; the rest tried to regroup and used all their power to charge up the Plasma torpedoes. Red motes of light flowed along the remaining ships, and they were preparing for a full broadside.

The two cruisers split up, each covering one end of the enemy phalanx formation.

"Xerox! What are the most threatening ships, in the formation," Stanforth asked the ships AI

"I believe it is the 2 carriers and the cruiser sitting in the center of the formation Sir!" replied Xerox

"Naslund! Point the fore MAC's and the starboard ones at the carriers, the top and port cannons at the Cruiser, and tell the Zhuckov to give the rest of the ships another volley of missiles," Bellowed Stanforth.

"Aye, Aye, Sir" yelled Naslund.

The Zeus turned at the Covenant formation, and then the MAC's started to turn towards their targets has the Zhuckov let out a volley of missiles. The guns fired from the Zeus with a tremendous roar, has 30 rounds raced towards their targets. The rounds hit and tore through the carriers shields with tremendous force; the remaining rounds gutted the carriers like only they only had toilet paper for armor.

Covenant Cruiser The Holy Rise of the GodsReach Military ComplexSept 24 2553 [1300]

Gullafff Oraaa was the captain of The Holy Rise of the Gods, and was a good one too. He had fought the first battle of Reach, and had gotten rid of the Super MAC Guns. So naturally he was shocked as he saw three of the fleets mighty carriers list and burn, and he screamed as they exploded.

"Tell the fleet to release all weaponry on those pathetic infidels!" roared Gullafff.

He watched the fleet fire their plasma weaponry at the battlecruisers, and from the corner of his eyes he saw 12 red-hot bolts race toward his ship. He rushed jumped to his chair and pulled the emergency thruster bar.

The cruiser started to jump away just has the MAC round hit the aft section of the ship. It started to lurch, has 3 more hit and wore down the shields.

"God help me!" prayed Gullafff

Then 8 rounds hit and tore through the cruiser. The ship fell, starting to lose power, the pilot tried has hard has he could to get the ship under his control. Suddenly! The ship started to break apart has it got into Reaches gravity well,and atmosphere. Gullafff said a prayer and The Holy Rise of the Gods disintegrated into millions of fragments in the atmosphere.

UNSC BATTLECRUISER ZEUS REACH MILITARY COMPLEXSEPT 24 2553 [1450]

AT last the final Covenant ship was cleared, and the Zeus was scanning for any single ship or enemy life pods that were ejected into space. As the mighty ship rounded the planet, Stanforth's heart jumped a beat. There was the Zhuckov, it was venting atmosphere at its port section near the bow.

"Get a comm. Link with the Zhuckov," Stanfoth growled.

An image popped up on the number three holotank, it was the Zhuckov's commander, Captain Douglas.

"Sir! Our bow port armor is at 2 meters with some breaches, multiple plasma bolts hit us, all of weapons are still online and electronics are 100%"spoke Douglas. "Forget about that sir, I detected there are still covie forces down at Reach.

"What is your total amount of soldiers, and vehicles in your ship Captain?" asked Stanforth